Christian's hearing for the robbery he and Aaron committed is coming up, however, Aaron has disappeared which puts a hole in Christian's defence. Tara has been training in rehab and is able to return to the Academy, but is frightened she will again injure herself. Ethan coaches Tara through her recovery, as they both struggle with over coming their fears about what life has in store for them. Abigail tries to be friendly with Kat because she thinks it will help her relationship with Sammy, which has been going downhill lately. Sammy, having spent the day with Christian to provide moral support for his upcoming court hearing forgets about a date he had planned with Abigail, causing even more strain on their relationship and leading them to break up.

During the weeks that have passed since the court hearing, Sammy and Christian become good friends and have decided to forget about girls, becoming inseparable, but Christian begins to ignore Sammy so that he can spend more time with Tara instead. Sammy becomes jealous and starts to think he might have feelings for Christian. Ethan and Kat's father, Sebastian Karamakov, arrives to direct the Academy's end of year production, The Nutcracker, putting pressure on all the students to audition and compete for roles.